Being a messenger of Bastet gave me a very different experience from my last 2 tasks and I had to thank everyone for the beautiful mistake and misunderstanding. After I lived in the Palace, I feasted on gourmet and delicacies for all my meals and I slept on soft mattress on a golden bed frame. Yes, your eyes and ears were perfectly fine when I said it's golden bed frame. Not only that, there were attendants who would massage my body to get rid of my fatigue and weariness. I am living in paradise.  *\(^_^)/*

Except for Andi, the other priests were very polite to me and I had a very peaceful and relaxing day job.

Whenever I was at home, er I mean in the Palace, I bumped into King Minu a few times. The deepest impression of our encounter was when I had lived there for a few days and I bumped into him at the garden. At that time, I spied King Minu in the garden and I wanted to make my silent exit from the ert but Warrior spotted me as it detected my scent. Warrior came speeding at me and jumped at me. I had to take a few steps back in order not to be crushed by it because he was so huge from normal lion! Warrior was happily at my face and snuggle against me. Boy, Warrior was really heavy.

"My Warrior adores you." King Minu turned and spoke to me.

"Well, at least Warrior knew who is kind to him and repaying his gratitude." I said sarcastically while rubbing Warrior's head which made it purring and snuggling to me.

I caught a brief serious expression on King Minu's face.

"You like gardening?" I decided to change the topic and break the awkwardness. 

King Minu raised his eyebrows," I prefer to be with the plants than with humans. Watching my plants growing well and healthily is a happy thing." 

I saw a gentleness in King Minu's eyes when he looked at his plants. After a while, he turned and looked at me. "Your name is Dongwan?"

"Yes." I nodded.

"How do you write your name in the language of your country?"

I picked up a twig and wrote my name (Hangul)on the soil. King Minu looked fascinated and he took the twig from my hand. He imitated and wrote my name too though his handwriting was ugly.

"You probably knew that I am no messenger of Bastet." I looked at my names on the soil.

King Minu's hand trembled. " You are when I acknowledged you are!"

"But why you...."

"Wan." King Minu called my name and stopped me from talking further. " I wanted you to train Warrior."

"Train Warrior?" I recalled the history immediately and knew that a war was coming and it blurted out unknowingly. " You want me to train Warrior for the war between your country and the Hittites?"

"How did you know!" King Minu was very surprised.

"I guess." I tried to lie to cover up for my blunder.

"That is right. Hittites are expanding their territories and they had conquered Syria and Palestian. Sooner or later, they will attack us. I intended to lead an attack on them and Warrior will be my personal guard."

I was stunned. I had never think that I was the one who trained Warrior which in turned was a great protector of King Minu as he lived to a rope old age. Far longer than any pharaoh in the history.

"You had that trust and faith in me?" I hesitated.

"I trusted you with my life." King Minu's eyes shone like the brightest stars in the dark night. I could not reject his request. I had a queer feeling: King Minu wanted me to reside in the Palace to train Warrior but what about Queen Torya? Was she keeping me here for security? I felt that Queen Torya was not a simple character as well.

"Wan, I needed you to train Warrior up before my battle." 

                                      *************************************

Very soon, I started training Warrior and King Minu came to observe my training. 

"How is the training going? Can Warrior be ready for the battle?" 

"I can only try my best and I can't promise you the final result." I looked at King Minu.

"Oh." King Minu smirked slightly. " In that case, you decide if I should bring Warrior or you along for the battle." 

"What?" I felt the corner of my mouth trembling. I saw an evil grin in his smile.

For the rest of the time, I poured in extra effort and heart in training Warrior at the enclosed battle training ground in the Palace. After 2 weeks, I was pleased with Warrior's performance. King Minu dropped by as usual but he was not wearing his crown or other accessories. In fact, he was cladded in his long white pants and leaving his top body exposed. I could see the radiance that was emitted from him. Son of the God of Sun! I started to believe this legend.

"How is my Warrior?" King Minu rushed towards us.

"Excellent." I replied and whistled for Warrior to start showing his performance. I saw smiles decorating King Minu's face and he looked very satisfied. He went over and spoke softly to Warrior and I was amazed at the caring side of him. While I was admiring King Minu, his head turned abruptly and I was caught off guard. I was unable to turn away and our gazes met. His dark iris looked into my eyes and his iris were like a whirlpool which attracted me to it. Though it was for a short while but I felt something which I could not explain. King Minu had those hypnotizing glare.

"Wan, I am having a grand feast to host the envoys from other countries in a few days' time. I want you to attend it."

"Can I not attend?" I pouted.

King Minu raised his eye brows furiously and glanced at me " You are the messenger of Bastet being sent to Egypt! How can you not attend the function?"

I decided to keep quiet in case King Minu exploded in anger.

Soon the day of the important function had arrived. After my shower, immediately several attendants came into the room with all sort of items. They quickly set of to work, combing my hair, massaging me and I was puzzled. 

"Messenger of Bastet, his Highness instructed us to dress you up for the function." The oldest attendant spoke to me and I guessed she was the in charge here.

"It is okay. No need...." I stammered to stop them as I felt like a lamb waiting to be slaughtered.

"This can't be as it is his Highness's order." Her face darkened and she turned to rest,"Get on with your work."

After some torturing, I was done and someone brought me a mirror. I looked into it and saw the new me! My eyes had sharp black lines drawn with the graphite powder ( eyeliner ) and they dusted light green eye shadow on me. I was dressed in a white flowy robe which hung on my left shoulder and exposed a bit of my right shoulder and chest. And they decorated me with accessories and I looked well more handsome now (^_^). I received compliments from the attendants on my good looks and a few of them even blushed when I smiled at them.

I was escorted to the function hall and the grandness of it made me wanted to flee away. The function hall was decorated with tall majestic flora and large, exquisite Persian carpets were laid at the centre whereby the different officials sat on it. The low tables in front of the officials had various sumptuous gourmet placed on them while the dancers cladded in a see through attire swayed away to the music. I was hesitant to enter because I knew I would attract attention but there was no way that I could sneak in without being noticed.

I took a deep breathe and decided to just walk in normally. As expected, everyone was looking at me. Aishi, it seemed that they had never seen a handsome dashing young man at all? I walked normally and scanned around and finally saw King Minu. He was lying on his side, resting in his throne which was donned with a leopard skin.

King Minu looked different today. He wore a red and white crown and his silky long hair hunged from the crown. He had eyeliner too but it was olive green in colour. The eyeliner enhanced his beautiful eyes which made them mystic. He had a white robe similar to mine but it exposed more of his tanned well tinned chest. No matter what, King Minu never failed to awed me. He was looking at me too and gestured me to go over to him. I was hesitating but I saw Queen Torya smiling at me and gesturing me come over too.

As I was making my way to King Minu, I saw the y Queen Nafada sitting on her throne on King Minu's right side while Queen Torya was in her throne on King Minu's left side.

"Sit here." King Minu shifted and he pointed to his left side. Oh my gosh, I was to share King Minu's throne with him! I wanted to refused it but King Minu pulled me to my seat. I just sat there obediently because there were many officials in the hall. I smiled at Queen Torya and noticed that she and Queen Nafada exchanged glances. Queen Nafada seemed very angry while Queen Torya was smiling widely.

"King Minu, may I enquire who is the handsome young man with you?" A tipsy official bowed to King Minu.

Handsome young man, me? Suddenly I felt that this short and dark official very friendly. Well human were superficial and who wouldn't like to hear compliments?

King Minu eyed me and smiled," He is the Messenger of Bastet."

"King Minu, was he the one who cured Queen Torya?" Another official stepped forward and bowed.

Oh my, I am getting famous here. 

"Yes, he is my saviour." Queen Torya replied. There was a low whispering and gasp among the officials after hearing Quern Torya. Feeling embarrassed, I turned away and I peeped at King Minu. I saw him winking at me and I quickly turned away. Instead I grabbed some food in front of me and ate them. I looked around and saw Jin in the crowd. He smiled and nodded at me.

"King Minu, I am from a far away land in the Middle East. I heard that the goddess Bastet will bring joy and blissful to the worship pets. Being her messenger, I hope I could be granted a chance to see my family here." 

Pfft, this official was trying to find trouble with me. If I refused, it would reflect badly on King Minu and I stole a glance at him. King Minu's face darkened. I was gloating instead because King Minu insisted that I was the Messenger if Bastet and now he forced me to attend this function. It was not that I could not do it but the spell would exhaust me totally and I was considering if I should perform it.

"I am sure that this is an easy feat for the Messenger of Bastet." Queen Nafada spoke suddenly. She had been quiet all the while and I saw the enmity in her eyes. The whole function hall was silent as everyone was anticipating for my answer. Under the current circumstance, I think that I had no choice.

"Of course." I spoke and walked to the empty space at the centre of the hall.